Those of you who made sig fig requests ages ago will probably know what this is about, for those of you who don't: the Crimson Crusade is a more RPG-like campaign set in Westeron, Medivo, that I am now finally about to start, in which players will have to support Queen Lara's invasion of the Falx lands through the use of their characters. You'll find all the rules and information in this (simple) guide.

Everyone starts out as a level 1 character with mostly average abilities. You can upgrade your abilities with skill points, and you get 1 skill point every time you level up. You can get XP by killing enemies, and finishing quests. Below is a list of how much XP is required to reach each level.

Skill points are used to upgrade your stats. Upgrading your stats can be done in the neutral zone, or in between stages. Below is a list of how much every upgrade costs. Keep in mind that you always have to pay the full cost, and have to get to the next level before you can get to the one beyond that. So if you want to upgrade from 5" move to 7" move, you'll need 2 SP (1 to get to 6, the other to get to 7).

Below are a number of abilities, but you can also learn custom abilities (you simply suggest them yourself and I decide the power of the ability based on the SP you're willing to give). Abilities can be upgraded like other stats.

As with abilities, everyone starts out with fairly standard equipment. I won't give everyone crappy-looking weapons, just crappy stats. So what looks like Drakensy's mace will just count as a handweapon at the start of the game. It also goes the other way around: if you buy a 'cape', or 'epaulettes', they may not show up on your character visibly, but their stats will count.

Equipment stats are also standard. You can buy or upgrade equipment with gold. When upgrading a weapon you already have, you don't have to pay the full price. So if a handweapon costs 5g and a fine handweapon costs 20g, you can upgrade it for 15g. You get gold by killing enemies, or finishing quests. Below is a list of all available weapons and equipment.

Loot from defeated enemies is (usually) considered 'broken' and cannot be looted, but you will get gold for defeating the enemy as loot (also so we don't have to f around selling everything you find).

Your character can only have as much equipment as he can carry with him, but there is a 'neutral zone' where you can drop equipment off. If a quest item happens to be a piece of equipment, you can just carry it along (but not use it).

Enchantments give bonuses to equipment. Example: heavy armour could be enchanted with lightning to shock attackers for 1d6 damage. Or you could for example enchant a weapon to do minor ice damage on top of its normal damage. Enchantments may be moved from one piece of equipment to another and are maintained when a piece of equipment is upgraded.

Mercenaries are people travelling with the Crusade that can be paid to fight at your side. They'll fight for you as long as they're alive, but they cannot gain experience (any experience of things they kill goes to your main character), and you don't get their equipment when they die. However, if they can stop you from dying, they may be well worth the money.

The Crimson Crusade will have several stages, each one of which will give you opportunities at gold, XP and fame. The stage ends when all quests have been completed, or if all characters have been incapacitated or have returned to the neutral area to rest. The neutral area is a safe zone where you will usually start out from and return to at the end of the stage.

If your character dies, it doesn't die permanently, but is incapacitated and will have to sit out the rest of the stage. No XP or gold gathered up to that point will be lost, but you can also no longer gain any. You will however be able to start out again at the start of the next stage.

There are no rounds, just actions. If you're faster than everybody else, that means you might get more actions in. An exception is when you're in combat or in an area where combat is being fought, then we have to follow round procedure (especially if you're fighting a fellow crusader)

Each stage will have a quest log that shows all available quests, unrevealed quests and the rewards they yield. Quests are usually revealed by talking to NPC's. Some quests will require that you talk to the NPC that gives the quest before you can complete it (otherwise your character wouldn't know about it). If multiple characters band together to solve a quest, they all get the full reward for it upon completion, but they have to declare they're working together ('me, x and y are going to work together to solve quest z'). Even though you can only share in experience if you actually helped to complete a quest. Some quests can be completed multiple times, but most cannot, so you'll have to be fast to make sure no one else snatches the XP away from you most of the time. Some quests have limits as to how many people are allowed to band together to do it. Multiple groups of characters can band together to solve a quest, but only one can finish it. If a character on a group is incapacitated, it frees up a 'slot' for another character to fill. 'Banding together' has one requirement however and this is that you all move to the quest area simultaneously. NPC's, mercenaries etc. don't count towards the maximum amount of people (since they can't get experience).

Character actions

There are several actions a character may take in his turn, all of which use up his turn (unless he has several actions)

Talk to NPC: NPC's may give quests, share information or be persuaded to take certain actions, but not unless you talk to them. You can just 'talk' or ask your character to say something specific if you have a specific goal. 'Talk to x', 'say x to y', 'persuade x to do y'

Observe: Allows a character to observe an accesible area without actually going there and thus endangering himself. 'Observe area X'

Go to: moves your character from one area to another in one go. 'Go to x.' You have to be at the edge of an area

You can string together a series of simple orders so you don't have to post again every time your character has taken a step. Example: 'go to the forest, talk to the hunter, search the area, build a trap, shoot arrows at a wolf to lure him into the trap, return to the neutral zone.

Characters

An Overwatch of all current characters, their status, abilities, equipment, original creators / current players and mercenaries.

Overwatch of all the rewards players have earned playing either knights of the realm or other people's characters - if they start playing a new character they maintain these rewards and can carry them over to another character.

If you have a character please post an acknowledgement so I know you'll be playing. If you already want to spend your first SP and 10 gold, or apply flaws, please do so. If you have any questions or find anything unclear, shoot.

Last edited by Bragallot on Fri Sep 05, 2014 5:49 pm, edited 34 times in total.

Everyone starts with only 1 HP, but at least you can't die permanently (well, not yet). Maybe someone should be nice and invest their first SP in a healing / resurrection ability because I'm pretty positive people are going to get incapacitated at one point, and no one picked a mage / healer type. To make it not completely useless to yourself, let's say friendly NPC's that are resurrected by you become your mercenaries and enemy NPC's that are resurrected can be killed again for more XP (but not gold). I'll just add it to the ability list.

Though everyone can choose their own strategy, I would also recommend getting the light armour or some buff potions / mercenaries for early battles since the fights are gonna get harder and it'll be difficult to get better if you get incapacitated a lot early. You'll earn that 10g back quickly if it keeps you alive longer. 4 armour is very little even when you have a shield.

You'll have to buy it. Basically you own everything you see on your stat page. I know it's a strange mechanic but I don't want your characters to look dumb or be inexplicably missing their equipment - plus I would probably lose the parts if I didn't keep them on the figs ...

Alright. You'll probably want to check the Stage 2 thread for available knights. Barad (bonus parry), Yagan (crossbow proficiency) and Alamar (strength, thus ability to wield a shield and a large weapon) are still open.